Richmond dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1884-1903, 1887-02-20

must he do? On the one hand the
tcrrorr Of the Law confront him on
the other dear life and love ply him
with arguments, and lie weakly yields.
And so he hies from the haunts
OF men and hides himself in some
mountain hollow. Thither is brought
at night by secret paths the fruit nc
cannot distill at home. But, 10 the
eyes OF Argus have watched his ways
and tracked him 10 his lair. An ir-
ruption is made epon him. He is i'm
prisoned and tried before strange jury
and an unfriendly judge. Professional
informers, spies, and detectives in
sure a quick trial and hard verdict.
Confinement at hard labor in q peni-
Tertiary in what he regards foreign
land is the penalty OF his crime. But
what. as he views it, has he donep He
has done, or rather he has attempted
10 do, what before the advent OF these
laws he and his fathers had been &C.
customed to do openly and without mo-
lestation. He has done, or has at
tempted to do, with his fruit, Just ex-
actly what other men do without of
fence with the yield Of their hocks and
fields. He has committed crime, but
TO him it is only paper crime, abso-
lutely destitute Of moral quality. He
has not stolen from his neighbors
nor in any way invaded their rights
He has only attempted to balk the
Government in the effort, which in
his view il had no right to make, TO
deny him the use and enjoyment OF his
ancestral property. He has believed
that was the stupendous blunder, that
the fatal crime which he must expiate
in a felon's cell-that his own is his
own.
Why should the Government harry
these simple souls with an unnecessary
tax. the collection of which costs as
much as it comes to? Why breed and
propagate that most hateful phase OF
human meanness displayed in profess
sional spies, witnesses, and informers,
who actually decoy men into crime
til they may get the price Of blood?
Why needlessly evoke and lash into
fury the lowest and most malignant
passions of the heart, which set whole
communities by the ears, and find issue
in alterations, hatreds, strifes, quar-
rels, fights, and even murder? And why
should the Government, which, in the
language of the Constitution, "was or
damned to establish justice" single out
two classes of people-the producers OF
tobacco and the producers of liquor
and compel them TO bear many times
their lust share of its burdens? Is
there anything in their calling that
awakens and develops patriotism that
the Government should rely on them
chiefly for support? / have indeed
heard-but on this point | speak
with the timid modesty that be-
comes man who speaks from
theoretical and not from practical
knowledge-that whiskey does in fact
make man patriotic. / had supposed
it.. however, to be vulgar error, and
had never imagined that the silly delu-
sion had become entrenched IN the
creed of statesman.
The time is suspicious for the re-
moval of the tax ON tobacco, on fruit
biandy-indeed for the immediate and
total extirpation of the whole hateful
system of excise taxes. 1t would
| give relief to the Government that
is suffering from surplus to
the farmers, who are suffering from
depletion. The Federal revenue IS
great, and is growing, and 1t
ought to be absted. The profuse
and lavish expenditures of public money.
stimulated by a redundant treasury,
which have characterized recent legis-
lation, and particularly that of the pres
| ent Congress, will, if long continued,
make the Government huge engine OF
oppression and wreck the country at
large. The portents are full Of peril
| Let us reset the landmarks of the Con
stitution and restore the Government
to its intended sphere of beneiicen'
operation by curtailing it of that enor-
| nous patronage which threatens to en-
| gulf both property and liberty alike.
| II pITRYRAR